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This Research Assistant position will support the PRIMA UK project. PRIMA is a proposal for a NASA astrophysics probe class mission, currently undergoing a Phase A study. PRIMA will be an astrophysics observatory designed to understand: the Origin of Planets and their Atmospheres; Co-Evolution of Galaxies and Supermassive Black Holes and the Buildup of Dust and Metals. In the UK we are leading on using advanced data analysis techniques to understand and enhance the spatial resolution.
The role
This role will be at the heart of that work, helping us to evaluate design decisions at this critical stage of the mission. Your work will be producing computer simulations of the images that PRIMA would observe under different designs. You will then be processing these synthetic images using our XID+ deconvolution software. You will need to provide comparative analysis for different scenarios for presentation to the PRIMA team.
About you
You will have been educated to degree level or have equivalent experience in a scientific subject. You will be very experienced with python coding. You will need to be able to use and adapt research code. You will need experience of running code on university high performance computer systems. You will need to be able to understand error analysis and be able to assess the differences between alternative scenarios in a rigorous way. You’ll need to be able to understand new tasks quickly and deliver analysis on short timescales.
Experience of applying these skills to astronomy data or very similar data sets is required. Due to the urgency and short time available for this work, knowledge of astronomy and the PRIMA mission would be a strong advantage.
About our school
We are a research-intensive School that simultaneously delivers outstanding teaching to our students. As such we aim to be consistently recognised as truly world leading in key areas of our science, by extending the international excellence, impact and visibility of our research. We aim to be within the top UK universities in our discipline areas, attracting high-quality students at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
We will establish a reputation as having a particularly open, stimulating, collaborative and supportive working environment for both staff and students, enabling the best possible outcomes for research, teaching and learning. We will further enhance our links with non-academic actors on local, national and international scales, and will maximize the impact of our work.
The School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences is proud to hold a Bronze Athena Swan Award.
Why work here
Our university is situated off the A27, next to the beautiful South Downs where you will enjoy everything that our 150-acre campus has to offer. We are accessible by public transport; Falmer train station is a five-minute walk to campus and several bus stops are located within campus. We also have dedicated cycling paths and encourage our staff to use these with our offering of a cycle to work scheme.
Sussex is a renowned, multi-accredited, research-led International University and this is only possible because of the people that work here. Whether you are a member of Faculty, part of a Professional Services team or a Student, it’s our people that make us great and we want you to be part of that.
